Over the River, Through the Woods
by badriddance
Summary: Charmkins fanfiction. It takes place right after the movie, with the Weeds all falling into the river. Since Ladyslipper went over the waterfall in that river, I sent the Weeds over it too.
1. Chapter 1

Charmkins fanfiction. Sad but true

This is set immediately after the Charmkins movie, with the Charmkins fleeing back to Charmworld and the Weeds all being swept downstream. Earlier in the cartoon, this river poured into a waterfall when Lady Slipper was in trouble, so I can only assume that the Weeds would have gone over too. Shortly after that is where this story takes place.

The pool of water, already churning from the waterfall emptying into it, was disturbed again when Dragonweed burst sputtering and spitting to the surface. Skunkweed was clinging to him and when the Bramble Boys surfaced, they tried to clamber up to Dragonweed's furry shoulders too. Thorny emerged a few feet away and spit an arc of river water out. They fought and shouted at each other all the way to the bank.

Dragonweed flung Skunkweed and the Brambles off with a strangled shout. They were quick to get out of his way. Thorny came out more slowly, limping a bit. Dragonweed was in such a state of outrage that he didn't seem to even notice how wet he was, stalking up and down the river bank while the others recovered.

"Where's Briar Patch?" Skunkweed asked, wringing out his coat tail. The poor Weed's smell had tripled when he had gotten wet, and the other Weeds staggered away from him with their eyes watering.

"Who knows?" Thorny smacked his head to drive water out of his pointed ears. "Maybe he got swept further down the river."

"He can find his way home," snarled Dragonweed, still too furious to care. He smacked Blue Bramble away from him and kicked Skunkweed further along the path. "Get moving, stickerheads!" The other Weeds scrambled to keep up and soon they had all headed back towards Thistledown. Only a pair of ice-blue eyes watched them go.

Curly-toed shoes danced lightly as a fairy through the rocks on the other side of the river, down past the main pool to where a much smaller falls emptied into a gentler cistern, shaded by willows. A ragged top hat slowly drifted in the shallows there. The silent watcher picked it up and underneath was a ragged head. She sneered to herself, then reached down to lift it up by the hair, only to drop it again with a hiss of pain. Tiny briar jabs left a line of blood drops down her hand.

She reached down into the water again, more carefully this time and lifted the head up. There was a body attached, but she only lifted the face. There was a mop of chestnut brown hair, pointed ears and nose in a round, almost gentle face. One of his lower canines jutted up against his upper lip, and a black patch covered his left eye.

"Briar Patch," she said, mockingly. Weeds weren't usually so clever with names. He didn't answer, being waterlogged, battered, and unconscious. She slid an arm around his shoulders and then jerked it away with another pained sound. His clothing seemed to be spun of nettles. Cursing under her breath, she set his hat on her own head and got a much more careful hold of him, then disappeared in a cloud of red dust and leaves.

Back at her hideaway, she got a better look. He was scrawny-looking and dressed in the remnants of formal wear. She wondered about that for a moment. Perhaps he had once been part of a well-to-do family, she thought, amused. More likely it was just a style he'd adopted to set himself above the backwater nitwits who'd left him to drown.

The affect was ruined by the nasty gash he had above one ear that she'd found while pumping river water out of him, and ghastly purple bruises were striping his thin back. The waterfall had given him a sound thrashing along the river bottom before spitting him into the cistern. Judging by the swelling, he also had a broken ankle. To tend him, she had been forced to find a way to literally handle his prickliness. If she was very gentle and slow, she found, the briars in his hair and fabric wouldn't catch on her skin. She could feel the sharp little points under her gliding fingers, but as long as she didn't grab or move against the grain, they didn't hurt her.

She wrung the water out of him, removed his soaked clothing, and bedded him down in her own moss bed. She'd put a poultice on his gash and ointment on his bruises and a homemade splint on his ankle. There were old bruises marking him too. She remembered Dragonweed's casual violence as he slapped the Weeds around. She tried to imagine the skinny Briar Patch standing up to the burly Dragonweed and giggled out loud. That would be the shortest showdown ever.

Briar Patch shifted at the sound, and she thought he might wake up, but he didn't move again. She studied his face more closely. His right eyelid quivered and her eyes were drawn to the patch covering the left one. There was a moment of hesitation, then she raised the patch to look underneath. To her surprise, the left eye seemed perfectly healthy, even when she peeled up his eyelid to peek. A little unnerved and intrigued, she let the patch fall back into place. Why would he wear a patch over a perfectly good eye? Then, he flinched and his uncovered eye blinked open.

Briar Patch came awake to a throbbing ache. He wasn't sure where it was coming from until he tried to raise his head. Sparks exploded in his vision and pain lanced from his skull down his spine. The jolt ended somewhere inside his ankle joint where new pain exploded.

He wasn't aware of the sound he made, but collapsed back on the bed. He struggled for a moment, trying to find a position that wasn't agonizing. Hands took his shoulders and held him still. Eyes so pale blue they were almost white looked down on him. He gasped and a woman's face leaned out of the shadows to smile impishly.

"Do you know me?" she asked. He took a deep breath that made him wince, then said weakly.

"No..." His usual high-pitched drawl was a ghost of itself, hushed and raspy from all the water forced in and out of him. She laughed and stood up over him. He could hear the rustle of leaves as she moved. She ran a finger down his long, pointed nose and he felt a tingle that quickly tightened into an itch. He could almost feel little blisters popping up on his skin. The woman's smile broadened into a full smirk.

"I," she said, savoring his discomfort. "Am Poison Ivy."


	2. Chapter 2

It was three days later before Briar Patch was healed enough to notice that his clothes were missing. Poison Ivy had left them to dry somewhere, she had said, but hadn't mentioned when she'd bring them back. The worst of his bruises had turned black, but wasn't hurting as bad now. His nose still itched and he was afraid to move his ankle. His whole body would fill with painful fireworks if he moved it too quickly.

Poison Ivy dropped in to the room from a passage way in the ceiling and landed without a sound. He assumed they were somewhere underground, but was nowhere near exploring strength to find out. He eyed her carefully as she approached him. Her arms were full of leaves and sprigs of things he didn't recognize. He couldn't be sure what she was up to and her smirks and secrets weren't confidence inspiring.

Poison Ivy seated herself next to him and gave his ankle a teasing, but gentle pat. While he watched, she stuffed the little plants she'd brought into her mouth and began to chew.

"Are you a Charmkin?" he asked. She sputtered, and her ice-blue eyes became mostly ice. "You're too pretty to be a Weed..." he added, which was certainly true. Her red outfit was sleek and clean and all her leaves were full and green. She made a snorting chuckle of a sound, then spat a wad of chewed leaf paste into her hand.

"I'm no tame little garden pet," she said. "The Charmkins can't live outside their neat little fences and gardens. I'm the Witch of the Woodlands, and I can take care of myself." She reached out to Briar Patch's face and he flinched back from her. Her face clouded, displeasure leaving a line between her eyebrows.

"I have briars," he stammered by way of explanation. "You'll stick your hands... The boss calls us stickerheads for a reason!" Her expression cleared to a more familiar, mocking one.

"I've been doing this every day since I found you," she informed him. "I've gotten the hang of it." Before he could protest again, she leaned in and began to dab the chewed paste on the gash. Tiny prickles of pain lit up in the wound, and Briar Patch did his best not to grimace as she patted the fresh poultice on. Then she blew on it so it would dry faster. Once it was done to her satisfaction, she ran her hands up into his hair just to make him squirm. Now that it was clean, his hair was soft and fine as thistledown, but growing here and there in it were tiny tendrils of briars. She felt the tiny jabs, but none of them broke the skin.

Briar Patch was unsure how to respond to such attention. He could feel himself blushing, and as if in reaction to the blood in his face, or perhaps such close proximity to Poison Ivy herself, the itch on his nose intensified worse than ever. He scratched at it timidly, hoping she wouldn't notice. She caught the movement however, and a real smile curved her lips. Leaning in even closer, she planted a light kiss on his nose. The itchiness vanished like a popped bubble and Briar Patch's blush went all the way to the tips of his ears.

"I can deal it and I can heal it," she told him.

'Th-that's amazing," he said, honestly impressed. He was still speaking softly, but she wasn't sure why. Maybe there was still some pain left in him, maybe it was out of deference to her, it didn't really matter. The compliment pleased her and she rewarded him with another sincere smile.

"It only works on my own itchies," she said, feigning a modest shrug. "And magic isn't much good against physical pain." She gave his ankle a miffed glance, like the bone had refused to heal to spite her.

"I'm glad you found me," he said. "The others wouldn't have been able to help. The Charmkins wouldn't have cared."

"Oh, they would've tried to help anyway," Poison Ivy's pale eyes rolled. "Tried to teach you to sprout blossoms or berries. Tried to make you BETTER... by their standards anyway."

"You really don't like them, do you?" He had settled down into the moss pillow. Ivy turned her sharp gaze on him.

"It's a matter of giving back as good as I get," she told him. "I'm a mirror for them. With an edge, of course." Her smirk came back. "Everybody knows it's bad luck when you aren't careful with a mirror."


End file.
